Friday, 16 May 2008

TWO POLITICAL STATEMENTS FOR THE PRICE OF ONE

It is happy hour in the wonderful world of politicized science! Two political statements for the price of one!

Obesity has now been linked to global warming if we believe the team of researchers at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Loyal to their ‘’end justifies the means’’ philosophy, it matters very little if at all, how ridiculous these nit-picking findings sound. How much money and precious human resources were wasted on this brand new piece of pseudoscience to further de-normalize and shame the obese into compliance?

Exactly like the anti-tobacco campaign, the anti-obesity campaign, has now ceased demonizing the product and is fast becoming a war against the obese. No longer content to educate citizens about unhealthy foods, we are now shamelessly targeting those who may or may not be consuming them. The obese will be joining the smokers in the ''undesirable'' ever growing social parade even faster than we had originally predicted. In fact it is an admitted strategy in the anti-obesity propagandists’ playbook as this article in the Ottawa Citizen reports:Tackle obesity like smoking, says researcher

Obese and overweight people require more fuel to transport them and the food they eat, and the problem will worsen as the population literally swells in size, a team at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine says.

This adds to food shortages and higher energy prices, the school's researchers, Phil Edwards and Ian Roberts, wrote in the journal Lancet published today. In their model, they pegged 40 per cent of the global population as obese with a body mass index of near 30. Many nations are fast approaching or have surpassed this level.

The researchers found that obese people require 1,680 daily calories to sustain normal energy and another 1,280 calories to maintain daily activities, 18 per cent more than someone with a stable BMI.

A slimmer population would lower demand for fuel for transportation and for agriculture. This is also important because 20 per cent of greenhouse gas emissions stem from agriculture.

Search this & other blogs & links

Welcome - Bienvenue

This bilingual blogspot replaces our news articles and commentary section in our main sites. If you would like us to post and comment any specific article, please mail your suggestion to votrevoix@cagecanada.ca.